The CCP has no idea how much they will miss this incarnation of the DL when he’s gone, because the 14th incarnation is their Arafat.
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The CCP has no idea how much they will miss this incarnation of the DL when he’s gone, because the 14th incarnation is their Arafat. Is our lasting image of Zhou Enlai to be the smooth, urbane diplomat showing up for talks in Geneva in a tailored-suit, silk tie, and a fedora, exchanging quips about the French Revolution? Or will it be the Zhou Enlai standing on top of Tiananmen with a red armband and a little red book, screeching in a high-pitched hysterical frenzy, “Long Live Chairman Mao!” as hordes of fanatical teenagers chant in the square and the Chairman looks on in approval? I highly recommend Ian Johnson’s review of the post-revisions National Museum of China. “Few countries can compete with China in so completely suppressing the shades of gray about their past.” When faced with an artifact which contradicts accepted narratives, China reacts one of two ways, both of which are similar to how CBS is handling Charlie Sheen. Students in my Late Imperial China class are familiar with Shen Fu, the writer and artist who wrote “Six Records” about a life of financial hardship, troublesome family, his loving relationship with his talented and dutiful wife Yun, and some of the indignities of trying to cling to elite status in the increasingly complex society of late 18th/early 19th-century China. The problem though is that of the six records, only four are extant…until now, and will wonders never cease, it just so happens that Shen Fu turns out to be an expert witness in the ongoing debate between China and Japan over the status of the Senkaku/Diaoyu islands. From China.org/China Daily: A hand-written document believed to be of a missing part of a Chinese literary work which showed the Diaoyu Islands as being part of China, was auctioned for 13.25 million yuan (2 million U.S.dollars) Monday in Beijing. The item was hand-written by Qian Meixi, a calligrapher in the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911). It is believed to be a copy of the fifth chapter of “the Six Chapters of a Floating Life” of Shen Fu, a writer and painter also from the Qing Dynasty. This island chain, once a tributary of |
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